Flyfishing is one of America's most enduring sporting traditions, and the number of flyfishing enthusiasts continues to increase dramatically in the United States and elsewhere as the pleasures of the sport become more and more widely appreciated. Consequently, the demand for new technology relating to flyfishing, and sportfishing in general, has never been greater.
A paramount interest among flyfishermen is mobility; that is, the ability to travel considerable distances in difficult terrain, and to execute finely tuned casting movements, free from the restrictions imposed by heavy and bulky gear. Consequently, a ponderous assortment of accessories is antithetical to the flyfisherman's credo, and technology which improves the portability of fishing tackle is in particularly great demand.
Along with portability, ready accessibility of fishing tackle is another primary need of the flyfisherman. Even the most skilled flycaster faces a major challenge in performing delicate casting activities which must be coordinated while the fisherman balances on unstable surfaces in rushing currents. Marshalling the appropriate control under these circumstances not only requires great freedom of movement, but also calls for fingertip accessibility of one's entire outfit of equipment.
Stripped down to the bare essentials, the flyfisherman can practice his art with nothing more than a rod setup and a suitable assortment of flies. The choice and variety of flies is critical, because the flyfisherman must be ready to deploy the one special fly that satisfies the singular tastes of an individual trout at a particular point in time. The chances for success and failure in this formula are infinite, therefore the ability to access and deploy a large number and variety of flies in a short period of time is essential.
Rapid deployment of fishing flies requires a storage device which can be accessed quickly, and which offers fast and easy selection among a large assortment of lures. Previous attempts to satisfy these needs have resulted in the production of a large host of fly storage containers; ranging from small, simple boxes, to large cases having multi-compartmented lure display panels, among other designs. Each of these storage devices shares a fundamental drawback, in that they all must be stowed away, for example in a vest pocket or tackle box, during periods of non-use. Retrieval of the storage device can therefore be frustrating and difficult, given that the flyfisherman typically has his hands occupied with other equipment at the same time he is searching and fumbling for his lure container. Access problems also arise during selection and removal of lures from the container after it has been retrieved. If the container is a simple box, the fisherman must poke through a tangled array of flies in the box to find the object of his search. Alternatively, if the container has display panels, the fisherman must open the box, leaf through the panels and select and remove the fly of choice, without dropping the box or flies. These activities can be particularly challenging when, as is often the case, the fisherman's dexterity is limited by numbness, wetness or other factors.
Currently known fly containers suffer other accessibility problems arising from difficult to handle containers and closure mechanisms. Both the containers and closure mechanisms are typically quite small, making them difficult to manipulate, especially when the user's hands are occupied or his dexterity is otherwise limited. In addition, the closures are typically plastic or metal snap-type closures, which tend to open suddenly, enhancing the likelihood of dropping or spilling the container or flies. Likewise, the plastic containers and closures are susceptible to breakage, causing further problems relating to access and equipment loss.
Attempts to overcome these problems relating to portability and access have met with limited success. These efforts include the age old tradition of affixing lures to the brim of a fishing hat. Another widely practiced method is to anchor lures in a patch of fleece material, such as sheep's wool, attached to a chest portion of a fishing vest. While both of these storage devices offer enhanced portability and access due to the body-mounted nature of the devices, they each suffer significant disadvantages. In particular, the hat-brim option still requires stowing and retrieval of the hat between lure changes in order to view lures for selection purposes. This requirement restricts mobility and access and enhances the risk of equipment loss. Likewise, viewing of lures mounted on fleece chest patches necessitates craning of the neck, and may require removal of outer clothing layers. In either case, viewing of a hook portion of the lure to determine whether it is barbed or barbless is generally impossible without complete removal of the hook portion from the hat or vest patch.
More importantly, canvass fishing hats and fleece patches are poorly suited as hook-receiving materials for releasably engaging lures. Canvass and other heavy, woven textiles are non-pliant, i.e. they are too unyielding to allow ready insertion and removal of a hook portion of the lure. Excessive force is necessary to insert the hook portion, because the heavy, tightly woven canvass material resists penetration by the hook portion. Likewise, canvass is not sufficiently pliant to allow easy disengagement of lures, because the heavy, tightly woven canvass threads catch unyieldingly on barbed hook portions of some lures.
Canvass and other non-pliant materials also lack sufficient resiliency to provide secure anchorage for barbless lures. Insertion of the hook portion of the lure through the material creates an opening which does not spring back to exert frictional force against a shaft of the hook portion to hold the lure in an engaged position. Consequently the hook portion may slide out of the loose opening in the canvass, causing the lure to disengage and potentially be lost.
In contrast to canvass, fleece materials generally have more than sufficient pliancy to enable easy insertion and removal of barbed and barbless hook portions. However, the loose fiber arrangement of fleece fails to provide sufficient resiliency to exert frictional resistance to prevent dislodgement of barbless hook portions, leading to an unacceptably high risk of lure loss.
The hook-receiving materials used in box-type lure storage devices also suffer from poor pliancy and resiliency qualities. Standard materials in this case include cork and closed celled foams, such as polystyrene. These materials generally have limited pliancy, and significant force may be required to penetrate or engage the hook portion into the material. Disengagement of the hook portion is also hindered by a dense, rigid cell structure of cork and styrofoam, such that pulling the hook out often causes chunks of the hook-receiving material to be ripped out. This results in degradation of the hook receiving material by the formation of permanent holes or gouges in the material. The poor resiliency of cork and styrofoam also contribute to degradation of the materials, because voids in the material surrounding inserted hooks fail to spring back or "self-heal" when the hook is disengaged. These holes and voids lead to failure of the materials to securely engage the hook portions of lures inserted in or near the holes. This in turn leads to increased lure loss and requires additional time for selecting undamaged portions of the material to insert the hook portions.
Holes and gouges in hook-receiving materials of lure storage devices can also serve as wells for pooling and retaining water within the material. This pooling and retention of water is highly undesirable, because it can cause rusting of lures rendering them non-functional. In addition, water retention can contribute to wetting of "hackle" portions of dry flies, which typically must remain absolutely dry for optimal lure performance.
In light of the above, a need exists in the sportfishing tackle industry for a lure storage device which is extremely portable and which causes minimal interference with the user's mobility and comfort.
A further need exists for a lure storage device which is readily accessible and which can be easily and securely manipulated under adverse conditions to provide quick, reliable access to lures.
A further need exists for a lure storage device which provides a convenient visual display of a large number of lures at a time, to facilitate rapid selection among a variety of lures. A related need exists for a lure storage device which enables quick visual selection between lures having different hook portion designs.
An additional need exists for a lure storage device which provides an improved hook-receiving material for rapid, dependable storage and retrieval of lures. A related need exists for a hook-receiving material suitable for receiving both barbed and barbless hook portions of lures, and which is not subject to rapid structural degradation through use.
Yet another need exists for a lure storage device which provides a water resistant storage environment to prevent wetting and rusting of stored lures.